The Hindu Business Line : Nine Indians in MIT list of innovators

NINE Indians figure in the list of 100 top innovators under the age of 35, chosen by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Technology Review magazine for this year.

The chosen 100 (TR100) represent a group that demonstrates that the barriers to innovation, both geographical and disciplinary, are crumbling, according to Technology Review.

The TR100 for 2004, the fourth year that the magazine has named its list of innovators, hail from places as varied as Singapore, Boston, South Korea, Israel and China, besides India.

Many are developing technologies that defy easy classification, often fusing recent advances in computing, medicine, and nanotech.

Among those named in the TR100 earlier and who went on to become purveyors of world-beating technologies are Sergey Brin (2002) and Larry Page (2002) of Google fame.

The list of Indian honourees for 2004 is as follows:

1. Mr Anuj Batra (34), Systems Engineer, Texas Instruments: Leads one of the industry's top teams advancing ultra wideband wireless technology, which provides the high transmission speeds needed for streaming-media applications while consuming little power.

2. Mr Ramesh Raskar (34), Visiting Research Scientist, Mitsubishi Electric: Built large computer display systems that seamlessly combine images from multiple projectors. The computer scientist's image-processing and graphics research may lead to new applications in entertainment, image-guided surgery, and user interfaces.

3. Ms Chaitali Sengupta (34), Systems Architect, Texas Instruments: Oversees the architecture of communications chips used in advanced cellular systems now coming to market. The chips let multimedia cell phones more easily handle Internet access, videoconferencing, and mobile commerce.

4. Ms Srinidhi Varadarajan (31), Director, Terascale Computing Facility, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University: Conceived and built the world's third-fastest supercomputer from a cluster of 1,100 Apple Macintoshes for $5 million. Other world-class supercomputers, in government, universities, and industry, cost $100 million or more.

5. Mr Mayank Bulsara (32), Cofounder and Chief Technology Officer, AmberWave Systems: Co-founded Salem, AmberWave to develop strained silicon, an advanced form of silicon that makes computer chips run faster and consume less power.

6. Mr Ravi Kane (32), Assistant Professor, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute: Created a highly potent anthrax treatment in which each drug molecule blocks multiple toxin molecules rather than just one. He is extending the concept to anti-HIV therapies.

7. Ms Smruti Vidwans (30), Postdoctoral Fellow University of California, San Francisco: Tuberculosis kills two million people every year, a tragedy of which Ms Vidwans was all too aware growing up in India.

Resistance to TB drugs is on the rise, and Ms Vidwans thinks the solution may be new drugs that don't kill the bacteria but block the proteins that allow them to reproduce in people. She is launching a company to develop such drugs.

8. Mr Vikram Sheel Kumar (28), Cofounder and Chief Executive Officer, Dimagi: Founded Dimagi in Boston to develop interactive software that motivates patients to manage chronic diseases such as diabetes and AIDS. His PDA-based systems are being used in rural India and South Africa.

9. Mr Ananth Natarajan (33), Chief Executive Officer, Infinite Biomedical Technologies: Co-founded his Baltimore firm to bridge the gap between research and patient care. One of its technologies will enable implantable cardiac devices to detect incipient heart attacks.

Among the list of judges that selected the TR100 - and rubbing shoulders with the likes of Prof Nicholas Negroponte, Chairman, MIT Media Lab - were Mr Sanjay Correa, Global technology leader for energy and propulsion technologies, GE Global Research, and Prof Tejal Desai, Associate Professor of Biomedical Engineering, Boston University.

More Stories on : Technology | People | Kerala

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page